Overview
Renewing Our Civic Culture is an initiative dedicated to promoting respectful dialogue across differing perspectives. By encouraging deeper understanding, empathy, and engagement across differences, it seeks to strengthen the relationships and shared values that sustain a healthy civic community.
This annual event brings together campus and community members for a guest lecture on civil discourse or civic engagement. The lecture is followed by a shared meal with facilitated discussion at each table. Together, these experiences provide opportunities to both learn about and practice meaningful dialogue.
Attend Renewing Our Civic Culture 2026
Event Details and Registration
When: Thursday, October 29, 3:30–7:00pm
- 3:30–5:00pm — Guest lecture by Dr. Ellen Ott Marshall (Emory University), “The Emotional Labor of Dialogue”
- 5:00–7:00pm — Dinner with facilitated table discussions
Where: UWM Student Union Ballroom, 2200 E. Kenwood Blvd, Milwaukee
This event is free and open to the public, though registration is required. For more information, contact Vice Chancellor Chia Vang (vangcy@uwm.edu).
Guest lecture: “The Emotional Labor of Dialogue”
Many models of civic dialogue assume a disposition marked by “rational calm.” However, the work we are doing together is emotional work. How do we think about the role of emotions in civic dialogue? How do we honor the knowledge emotions give us, remain true to them, and still converse constructively?
Featured speaker: Dr. Ellen Ott Marshall
Dr. Ellen Ott Marshall is Professor of Christian Ethics and Conflict Transformation at Candler School of Theology and in the Graduate Division of Religion at Emory University. Dr. Marshall focuses on contemporary Christian ethics, with particular attention to violence, peacebuilding, conflict transformation, and moral agency under constraint. She has published numerous articles, edited three volumes, and written three books including Parenting for a Better World (co-edited with Susanna Snyder, Chalice Press, 2022) and An Introduction to Christian Ethics: Conflict, Faith, and Human Life (Westminster John Knox Press, 2018). Her current research asks what ethicists can learn about agency and constraint by studying the creative process of artists.
Past Events
The Virtues of Civil Discourse (2025)
The inaugural Renewing Our Civic Culture event was held on October 17, 2025. This event was made possible by a grant from the Tommy G. Thompson Center on Public Leadership. Event sponsors were Community Empowerment & Institutional Inclusivity and the Division of Student Affairs; co-sponsors were the UWM Honors College, Department of Philosophy, Department of Political Science, and Classics Program.
Our invited guest lecturer was Dr. Jed Atkins, Dean of the School of Civic Life and Leadership at UNC-Chapel Hill. In his talk, “The Virtues of Civil Discourse,” Dean Atkins explored how civic discourse—the practice of deliberating with others as fellow members of a shared community—can be taught and practiced on campus. Drawing from real-life stories in the classroom and beyond, he showed how higher education may equip students to live, learn, and listen as members of our pluralistic democracy.
Watch the recording below of Dean Atkins’ lecture.